Contents

Her life

Kateri Tekakwitha the daughter of a Mohawk chief, Kenneronkwa, and a Catholic Algonquin woman, Kahenta, was born in the Mohawk fortress of Ossernenon near present-day Auriesville, New York. Kahenta was baptized and educated by the French in Trois-Rivières like many of the Abenaki. She was captured there at the start of a war with the Iroquois and taken to Kenneronkwa's homeland.[1] When Kateri was four, smallpox swept through Ossernenon, and Tekakwitha was left with unsightly scars on her face and poor eyesight. This outbreak took the lives of her brother and both her parents, Kahenta (Flower of the Prairie) and Kenneronkwa (Beloved). She was then adopted by her uncle, who was a chief of the Turtle Clan.[2] As the adopted daughter of the chief, many young men sought her hand in marriage. However, during this time she began taking interest in Christianity. Her mother was Christian and had given Kateri a rosary, but her uncle took it away and encouraged her not to follow that religion.

Unable to understand her zeal, members of the tribe often chastised her, which she took as a testament to her faith. Kateri exercised physical mortification as a route to sanctity. She would occasionally put thorns upon her mat and lie on them, all the while praying for the conversion and forgiveness of her kinsmen. She discontinued this practice when her close friend, Marie Therese, and her confessor expressed their disapproval. Because she was persecuted by her Native American kin, which included threats to her life, she fled to an established community of Native American Christians in Kahnawake, Quebec, where she lived a life dedicated to prayer, penance, and care for the sick and aged. In 1679, she took a vow of chastity, as in the Catholic expression of Consecrated virginity. A year later, on April 17, 1680, Kateri died at the age of 24. Her last words are said to be, "Jesus, I love You!"[2]

Epitaphs

Her grave stone reads:

"Kateri Tekakwitha

Ownkeonweke Katsitsiio
Teonsitsianekaron

The fairest flower that ever bloomed among red men."

She is called "The Lily of the Mohawks," the "Mohawk Maiden," the "Pure and Tender Lily," and the "Flower among True Men," the "Lily of Purity" and "The New Star of the New World." According to Rev. Lawrence G. Lovasik's "Kateri of the Mohawks," her tribal neighbors called her "the fairest flower that ever bloomed among the redmen."[3]

In his scholarly but secular Facing East from Indian Country: A Native History of Early America (Harvard University Press, 2001), Daniel K. Richter writes: “On a personal scale, whatever private pains those who have prayed to Kateri down through the years have endured, her mythic story has provided meaning, hope, and even healing. But on a broader, cultural level. . . [her story helps] to resolve the moral contradictions raised by the European colonization of North America and the dispossession of its Native inhabitants” (p. 81).

Veneration

According to eyewitness accounts, Kateri's scars vanished at the time of her death revealing a woman of immense beauty. It has been claimed that at her funeral many of the ill who attended were healed on that day. It is also held that she appeared to two different individuals in the weeks following her death.[4]

A larger-than-life-size bronze statue of Blessed Kateri depicting the Saint kneeling in prayer, installed in 2008 and created by artist Cynthia Hitschler[7] is featured along the devotional walkway leading to the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe Cathedral, La Crosse, Wisconsin.[8]

The final step in the canonization process is awaiting a verified miracle. Blessed Kateri's feast day in the United States is celebrated on July 14. Kateri was for some time after her death considered an honorary (though unofficial) patroness of Montreal, Canada, and Native Americans. Fifty years after her death a Convent for Native American nuns was opened in Mexico, whose residents pray daily for her canonization.